PANJIM: The Corporation of the City of Panjim has stood its ground and refused to submit to the ‘blackmailing’ tactics being employed by its daily wage workers, allegedly being incited by their union leaders, officials said Wednesday. The Corporation has also filed a complaint against two striking workers alleging that they had entered the CCP premises and were threatening and intimidating the workers who had rejoined work.
“We have engaged 50 labourers and six trucks have been deployed under police protection. By Thursday morning all the garbage from commercial establishments would have been lifted,” Commissioner Sanjit Rodrigues told media Wednesday, adding that the CCP has taken strong objections to some union leaders who have not bothered to reply to calls and come to discuss the issue.
According to officials, the CCP has also sent notices to all workers to join work within 24 hours failing which action would be taken against them, even as the Collector has issued orders that the workers take their strike either to Azad Maidan or parade grounds, Campal.
“The vehicles and workers will be given police protections while doing their job,” Rodrigues said adding that they had a meeting with the workers and promised to look into all their demands, since some of the demands had to be sorted out with the government.
It may be recalled that the CCP workers have held the city to ransom, going on strike from Tuesday and stopped garbage collection and cleaning of the city streets demanding that they be made permanent, since many had been daily wage workers for 10 to 15 years.
The main demands were the regularization of over 320 daily wage workers, increase of daily wages from Rs 221 to Rs 498 and time bound scale for other permanent workers.
